Seventh Street was closed Saturday morning while the new chiller for the church was delivered and positioned on the parish house roof.
Saturday morning was a busy one while the building contractor and mechanical contractor literally stopped traffic for the delivery of the church’s new chiller. Not too different from a home system, the chiller is used to produce chilled water that passes through a condensing system in order to make cold air for the air conditioning.
To get ready for the day’s events, the old chiller had to be disconnected and prepared for removal. That chiller, a source of many a warm Sunday service, had all but expired by the time the renovation began. In addition to not cooling very well, the contractor discovered that it had been leaking oil, which had begun to compromise the roofing membrane. That problem is now solved and additional layers of protection have been placed immediately beneath the new chiller–just in case.
The crane work began around eight o’clock. It actually took longer to set up and tear down the crane than it did to remove the old chiller and position the new one. Counterweights on either side of the crane stretched the entire width of Seventh Street. The counterweights were so heavy, they had to be brought on a separate flatbed trailer.
Once work began, the old chiller came off the roof and into a waiting truck to be hauled away. At the other end of Seventh Street, the new chiller–in two parts, a base and a condensing unit–stood ready in the bed of yet another truck. Workmen from both the general contractor, Hostetter & Keach, and the mechanical contractor, Southern Comfort, led a successful operation.
A giant crane straddled our section of Seventh Street on Saturday morning as the old chiller was removed and a new one positioned on the parish house roof.
The new chiller came in two parts, a base and a condensing unit. The base is shown here above the parish house roof.
The new chiller comes in for a soft landing atop the parish house roof.
